Thursday, May 28, 2009

Here's another way of looking at weekly unemployment claims: the 6-mo. annualized change in the four-week moving average. It's quite clear in this chart that the deterioration in the labor market has moderated signficantly. Looking at the weekly data in isolation tells the same story—claims have been flat since the end of January. Workers are still being laid off in relatively large numbers, but the pace of layoffs has not gotten worse over the past four months. I think it's safe to say the worst is behind us.